


Mass Effect Relationship Week 2020

by crqstalite



Series: Eye of the Storm [2]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Annika Johansson - Freeform, Brione Petrakis, Citlali Velasquez, Eye of the Storm, F/F, F/M, Kodelyn Shepard - Freeform, Mason Velasquez, Pre-ME2, warnings will be in each chapter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:41:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24596179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crqstalite/pseuds/crqstalite
Summary: My works for Mass Effect Relationship Week 2020 on tumblr. Only one prompt was really romantic, all others are either familiar or platonic.
Relationships: Ashley Williams/Original Female Character(s), Minor Female Shepard/Kaidan Alenko
Series: Eye of the Storm [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1747411





	1. Day 1 - Scintilla.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (n.) a tiny, brilliant flash or spark; a small thing; a barely visible trace.  
> Day 1's prompt: First Impressions.
> 
> This chapter focuses on Citlali Velasquez (my Shepard's younger sister, an L2 biotic and pilot) and Joker's first meeting before the events of ME2. No warnings apply except for self-destructive thoughts on Joker's part.

The first time Joker meets Citlali Shepard-Velasquez is during one of the lowest points in his life. When he can barely focus on what’s going on around him, and everything feels like its lost its meaning. He hasn’t flown anything, much less the Normandy for what feels like forever, hasn’t seen the old crew in just over a year. Liara was gone, disappeared off the map. Garrus wasn’t going to be found, not after he stopped trying to rejoin C-Sec. Tali went back home to the Flotilla, and so did Wrex, to Tuchanka. Hell, even Kaidan didn’t stick around, and instead went off into the Alliance for something or the other. The last time he saw all of them together was at Shepard’s memorial service.

Not a word was said to him. He’s not sure whether to be grateful with the lack of attention or concerned about the silence on his hand in Shepard’s death.

Alchera still manages to haunt him in the early morning hours, dragging himself out of bed with aching bones just to end up back in it a few hours later. Probably had a lot more self-destructive thoughts than was healthy, but what else was new? He’s anxious to get back into space, anxious to finally get off this blasted station that’s way too white and yellow for him to be comfortable i. If he was given a mission to help Shepard again, in anyway that he could, maybe the ache in his chest would ease. He could get behind anything Shepard did, anything Shepard was willing to fight for. And if that was Cerberus, then so be it.

Maybe _when_ (not _if_ – Miranda was very confident in the Lazarus Project’s completion, and he knew better than to piss off someone from Cerberus when he couldn’t even get a headstart) she woke up, he’d feel better.

“As for your new allegiances among us, we’ve found a capable pilot for when Commander Shepard wakes,” He can hear Miranda clicking down the hall in those godforsaken heels, but a new pair of shoes following after her. Not heels, but not military boots either. He turns from his work station, deciding to pull himself up into a standing position in case Miranda has brought someone of some high rank in Cerberus with her. They don’t tend to get a lot of new recruits (or at least, since he’s been there), and he has chosen to remain rather reclusive since he arrived proper in their service, “Though your service record is rather…limited, I and the Illusive Man believe you’ll work well together.”

A co-pilot then? He didn’t even have one of those on the SR-1. Someone else took the helm at night so he could get a little shut eye and whatnot, and y'know not drive them into a relay headfirst because of the lack of sleep, but he’d never actually had someone else in the seat next to him except for the lieutenant on occasion. That makes him a little nervous, and a little annoyed Miranda didn’t say a word about this assignment to him either. He was Jeff Moreau, graduated top of his class and he sure as hell didn’t need a co-pilot. Hell he had a service record to back it up, unlike whoever she’d brought on. Navigating the battle of the Citadel was just one of them, Therum and Virmire being others. The person with her is quiet, and doesn’t respond as they grow closer to his glorified cubicle. Logging reports on colonies he made supply drops to, that could wait. He needed to know who his new babysitter was, and how soon he could convince them to lay off and find some other job on the new ship the Illusive Man had promised him.

He takes a pause when the two round the corner, but he doesn’t focus on Lawson at first. The woman with her is far from what he was expecting. Maybe someone who was uptight, someone like Shepard with her hair pulled up far from her face and with some monotone voice like every AI he’d ever met. Someone who’d probably tell him not to do half the shit he did, and would probably report him for every little thing he said. Would probably get amusement from seeing him suffer until the new ship they had yet to reveal to him was stolen out from underneath him for all the glorified writeups he’d receive from someone like that.

That’s not the reading he gets from her in the slightest. Hands on her hips, with a similar hat to his own mashed over her curly chestnut brown hair that tumbles out from underneath the brim of the cap. The Cerberus uniform isn’t ill-fitting on her either, if he’s being honest she’s only a few years younger than he is, and those startling aquamarine eyes stare back at him. Tired, annoyed maybe. A scar runs through her cheek, freckles decorating around it and bags underneath her eyes. Short, but far from stout. Her lips pucker out, colored with a maroon lipstick as she surely takes him in the same way he does her.

She’s pretty.

And she looks just like Shepard, save for the eyes and uptight attitude.

_Oh shit._

“Mr. Moreau, we’ve found your co-pilot,” Miranda clears her throat, pushing her hair over her shoulder, “Miss Citlali Velasquez, candidate for Flight Lieutenant of the SSV Iwo Jima before the crash of the SR-1 over Alchera.”

Velasquez? As in the _same_ Velasquez surname as Shepard-Velasquez?

Just his luck, and only now was he remembering that talk in the mess right before Virmire with everyone talking about their families. A few names stuck out to him now, someone named Sarah from Ashley’s family and some from Wrex’s, but now he’s beginning to remember the younger pilot with the Shepard name. Checks out, yet only referred to as Lali. Had been considered for a posting such as his before his joyride in 2183.

Does she recognize him?

He’s fucked if she does.

“Mr. Jeffrey Moreau, Flight Lieutenant and pilot,” It’s a clipped introduction, and he nearly mentions his status on the SR-1 himself before he takes a pause and it dawns on him that Miranda did it for a reason, leaving out his service record. He glances at her, and that omnipresent smirk is on her face. Maybe she knows that surely Shepard’s younger sister (he thinks that’s who he’s looking at) would blame him for the SR-1’s crash. That, would be bad for business, and this new partnership. He’s at least conscious enough to make that decision, and it might save him some ill-fated fatality later. It feels like electricity is running through the air, though for now he’s blaming that on the biotic standing next to him instead of his own nerves betraying him.

Begrudgingly, she holds out her hand to shake his. He takes it. She’s warm, with a firm grip that says she undoubtedly means business. He doesn’t know whether to tell her that any tighter, and she might shatter a few of his fingers, but he hides his gratefulness when she lets go, “Hope you’re up to raising a little hell with me, Mr. Moreau.”

“Sounds good,” He answers. There’s a twinkle in her eyes, popping out against her tawny brown skin that says he might be in okay hands, “Don’t know what we’re flying yet, but Shepard’s in good hands with you and me.”

“She sure as hell will be, with me at the helm this time around,” Her expression darkens, “My sister died trying to save some damn pilot on the _Normandy_. Hope they’re happy, wherever the hell they are. Damn glad she’s even a little alive. Can’t think of the name of her pilot right now, but you wouldn’t be against a manhunt, yeah?”

Joker tries not to make it obvious he’s about to start sweating bullets if she goes on like this. So she was aware of who he was, just hadn’t made the connection between said pilot and the one that was standing in front of her presently. He wonders how long that’d last, and how many surgeries he’d need to logically run from her, “Right, of course not.”

“Play nice, the both of you. I’ll have assignments for you in the morning, 07:00. We’ll see just how well the Illusive Man did with the recommendation,” Miranda responds, knowing she’s effectively done here playing the bridge between the pilots, “Citlali, your bunk is upstairs, across the hall from the women’s washroom. Someone will get you set up with an omni-tool and station. Jeff–” She narrows her eyes at him, “I still haven’t received your report from the last colony your delivered to. The Collectors aren’t exactly a joke, and we didn’t bring you here to freeload.”

“I’ll send it, was just about to do that when you got here,” He holds up his hands in defense, and the woman raises an eyebrow in disbelief, “Promise.”

Once the operative has left, she slips her hands from off her hips, pulling her hat off and running a hand through it before replacing it, tousling her tawny brown curls over her shoulders. Similar to his own habits, even if it was unconscious. She doesn’t say anything for a moment, squinting at his form as he leans against the wall for more support. He was never one to stay standing for long, “Kinda look like you’re about to chew me out for something. Sorry?”

“You probably outrank me anyway, Moreau. Haven’t done anything to piss me off yet,” For some reason, he wants to see her smile beyond just that little smirk she and his ‘supervisor’ have going on. There’s a space between her two front teeth that he can see just underneath her lips, and through his somewhat unfocused haze, he can see she has twin moons sparkling from her earlobes, “It’s what Lawson said, never enlisted but I was considered for some positions a while back. I like to fly fast and play loose with regs.” She sighs longingly, “So upset I got looked over for the position on the Normandy. She was one hell of a ship.”

“Uh, yeah. She was.” He answers uneasily, considering whether or not she takes the hint to leave, “Damn best thing I’d ever flown.”

And also immediately regrets what he alludes to twenty seconds after it’s left his mouth.

She furrows her brow, crossing her arms and leaning against the wall next to him. No luck on that front then, “Sounds like you’re speaking from experience, lieutenant,” She chuckles sadly, “To be the lucky bastard who both flew it and got his commanding officer killed. Double edged sword if you ask me.”

 _Well_ , no one said they had to be friends. But it still stings when she says it. It wasn’t as if he was over Alchera just yet. He doubts he ever will be.

He misses Shepard. They weren’t the best of friends, but she still left a hole where she used to be. They were all tied together by Shepard, and now that she was gone, he lost the friends he made because of her. No one from the old crew blames him for her death, even if his last conversations with Kaidan about going to Cerberus for her were very clipped and cold, he wants to blame that on the fact he did try to recruit an Alliance officer to a terrorist organization, and not that he’d gotten who he loosely assumes is his girlfriend killed because of his stubborn streak.

“I am,” He answers, she narrows her eyes in response. He swallows down his pride and shrugs, “Most people call me Joker.”

She pushes herself back off the wall, and he prepares himself for the onslaught he’s sure to receive as the look of shock and anger flash across her face in realization. He’d rather not have to sleep with one eye open at night wondering if she’d found out his real identity in the end and have to watch for a knife in his back. At least now he can certainly say his life is not set in stone.

“Does Miranda know?” Is all she asks, her expression entirely blank and not betraying a single emotion to him, “Did she know when you got here?”

“Yeah. Probably whole reason they gave me the position as Shepard’s pilot again.” He says, watching as another report comes in on his omni-tool. He tries to give her a sarcastic smile, “Not like I’m entirely over it either. Don’t worry, I won’t get you killed too.”

She pauses, her mouth slightly parted with a thought just on the tip of her tongue as he turns back around, sliding back into his seat. Relief washes over his body, the burning in his joints receding accordingly. Damn, did he miss Chakwas, “You can go now, you know. Doubt you’d want to stick around with me for too long.”

“You –” She falters, before he feels his chair turn around without a hand on it. She’s gently glowing blue and white, though it fades a minute later as she comes closer, “My sister died, yeah. But…she spoke like you were the second coming of the Mars relay. Means she died saving the best damn pilot in the Alliance. Ko-Shepard would never just give up her life for anyone.”

She shakes her head, pinching the bridge of her nose, “Can’t believe Miranda paired me with the last person to see my sister alive,” She mutters, the _killed_ just barely avoided by the tone of her voice and substituted with saw, before lifting her head to face him again, “Not going to lie, I’m not exactly happy to work with you, whether she’s alive or in a coma or what. I’m sure I don’t have to spell it out for you.”

“Yeah, I get that. I’m not happy working with me either.” He says sarcastically, giving her a look that says 'for the love of Sovereign please leave’, “Didn’t Miranda need you for something though?”

“Yeah,” She says noncommitally as she looks at him up and down in a way that screams Shepard at him, “I’ll see you at seven tomorrow then, _Joker_.”

He doesn’t waste another minute watching her go, before she turns around the corner and disappears. So his new co-pilot didn’t want to kill him, not yet at least. And she was a biotic. Sounded great, definitely was extending his lifespan for decades.

He groans at the empty document in front of him, before pulling up the UI and subsequently the personnel report Miranda had badgered him to read for weeks. So not a babysitter. Possibly a cause of death. Her groans inwardly, her words and now the document confirming her relation to Shepard. Her track record checks out, though he raises an eyebrow at her year long stay at Jump Zero as a child (remembering off handed comments about the station from Lieutenant Alenko), a few years at Grissom Academy. Trained to be a pilot while there, and like Miranda had said, was a candidate for Iwo Jima in 2182. Young. Twenty four years old to his twenty nine.

Something says he and their new ship are going to be in, at best, okay hands.


	2. Day 2 - Solivagant.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (a.) wandering alone.   
> Day 2's prompt: Hobbies.
> 
> This chapter focuses on the common hobby of Ashley Williams and then love interest of Annika Johansson, which is repairing weapons prior to the events of Virmire. Allusion to major character death, Ashley's, is the only warning.

“Skipper…” Ashley says warningly, sliding a capacity mod back onto her own rifle.

“I know what I’m doing, Ash.” The blonde woman raises an eyebrow, brushing a curl out of her eye as she replaces a mod on Shepard’s rifle, “You might be gunnery chief, but I’m still corporal. I can take care of weapons.”

“Not that I don’t believe you, but you know that mod is going to throw Shepard off, right?” Ashley taps the new barrel of the gun with a nail, “Too heavy for her.”

“She’s been asking for something with more of an oomph, you know that as well as I do,” Finally, Annika lifts her head from her focus of the day, lavender eyes twinkling in the dim light of the cargo bay. She shifts her legs from underneath her where she’d been sitting on a crate to look up at Ashley, “Short of giving her a Mattock instead, this is the best solution. More power without giving her a brand new gun, just a simple upgrade to the barrel is all. It’s not like she’s a vanguard and needs the weight gone…we’ve still got ultralight material to put over this, right?”

“I told you we’ve needed a resupply for weeks now,” Ashley shakes her head, giving her an ‘I told you so’ look that makes Annika pout, “Already applied them to Vakarian’s sniper rifle and Alenko’s pistol. You know how they get, they rely on those things like water.”

Annoyed, she considers taking it out before she stands from her seat on the crate next to the weapons table, sliding it onto the cool metal surface, “And I told Shepard we needed to requisition more if we were going to really hit the Geth where it hurt if she keeps bringing in all these new weapons. Don’t put this on me, Ash.”

“Never said I was,” She responds. Though, her voice retains a softer tone as Annika begins rustling around for other mods underneath the table and surely to prove her bluff on them being out of the lightener, “I’m just saying, we can’t risk it going in blind and with mods we’re not used to on Virmire. Who knows what we’ll find down there? Maybe a whole damn nest of Geth.”

“And I’m saying that if the Commander wants her firepower, then she’ll have to compensate elsewhere for recoil,” Ashley rolls her eyes, crossing her arms as Annika tsks in disappointment. No material to lighten the load, and true to Ashley words, they hadn’t properly restocked or upgraded for a while now. No mods that were any lighter to replace the one she’d just installed either, not without sacrificing the whole reason she’d found it in the first place anyway, “Not like she has many other options before we give her a shotgun and throw her at a Colossus.”

After a pause, maybe of thought because the other woman laughs goodnaturedly, Ashley holds out a hand to pull Annika back up from her crouched over position. She accepts it gratefully, though there’s a smirk that smolders just beneath her mahogany irises. Annika sighs loudly, “I’m not admitting you’re the better weaponsmith, just because I can’t find the mod, Williams.”

“Then you’d also know the recoil on Liara’s pistol is going to screw her over, right?” She asks, smugly gesturing towards the small gun that their new Asari teammate used. It was surprisingly unused, though Annika blames that on the fact that other than Noveria, she hadn’t seen much action outside of their _excursions_ to uncharted worlds, “She doesn’t rely on it much, but –”

“But biotics have to play it safe yeah, yeah I know. But the damage that the increased clip size and piercing mod is going to do? It’ll more than be a fair replacement. Poor girl will have to get used to it if she intends to stick around.” Annika responds, before doing a double take and narrowing her eyes at the mod that was recently installed on the clean Stinger they’d finished hours ago. It could become a problem, especially if Liara wasn’t used to having such a heavy weapon. By Alliance standards, she was considered an adept, and adepts were usually lithe and light on their feet. Weighing her down…

But she didn’t want to admit that to the woman in front of her. Annika would consider that defeat. And she was determined to defend the decision.

“Thinking over it again?” Ashley asks, as if she can read her mind.

“And what about Wrex and Tali? You stabilized their shotguns, but you took away the capacity and pellet size.” Annika responds, sliding the offending Scimitar over to the gunnery chief, “You know that’s like, Wrex’s entire combat style, right? Up and in your face, face full of big ass pellets.”

“The closer he is, which he always ends up being, the more damage it will do. Less recoil equals more accuracy, which equals more Geth flailing on their asses,” Ashley says, moving to store the rest of the weapons away, “You know that.”

Annika rolls her eyes, leaning against the weapon table while Ashley meticulously places each weapon back in the correct locker. Annika might only be the second-rate weaponsmith on the _Normandy_ (that wasn’t to say she also hadn’t picked it up shortly after Akuze as a coping mechanism – little wires and mods were easier to deal with than her therapist asking her all sorts of questions everyday of the week), and they might butt heads a lot about mods, but she wouldn’t want to do it with anyone else, “Yeah, I know that.”

“Good. I’m headed up to the mess, you want anything?” Ashley asks, pulling her hair tie out and letting her hair fall around her shoulders, “Energy bar, water?”

It’s hard to look away from her for a second there, watching as she puts it right back up into a ponytail at the base of her neck. She might not be the most feminine woman, but Annika can’t keep from admitting she’s still beautiful. Smart. Tactful. Just enough sarcasm where it’s witty instead of annoying.

And rather mean when it came to modding weapons. She’s convinced Ashley does it to get a rise out of her. Yet weapons were fickle things, and they’d probably solved more problems together rather than apart.

“Skipper?” She asks again, and Annika jumps a bit as Ashley smiles, “You want to come up with me? We probably won’t be planetside 'till at least noon tomorrow anyway.”

“Yeah,” She wipes her hands down on her pant legs, striding after the gunnery chief, “I’m still right, you know.”

“Keep telling yourself that, Nik. Maybe you will be right one day,” Annika gives her a mock offended look, gently nudging her shoulder, “Hey, you don’t have to injure the messenger!”

“Well, if the messenger is a pretty lady, I guess I won’t,” Annika shrugs as she steps out of the elevator, making a quick turn into the mess. Ashley has a somewhat stunned look on her face before she catches up, Annika grinning.

“You can’t compliment me into buying you a new Raptor through flattery, Skipper,” Ashley reminds her, and Annika groans. That hadn’t been her original plan, but maybe she _had_ been dropping hints about the new model around the other woman more than usual, and maybe Ashley _did_ know that she loved their line of assault rifles, “Or install those dubiously-legal mods you found on Noveria.” She adds, which puts the next nail in the coffin.

“You’re killing me woman, and they’re not dubiously-legal, Shepard just didn’t want them because she uses a different brand. Parasini gave them to us for a job well done,” Annika sticks out her tongue, frowning as she washes her hands and starts the coffee machine. Ashley comes around a moment later, eyes sparkling with mischief, “Whether they can blow up in my face or not if I install them incorrectly is beyond the point.”

“Riiiighht,” Ashley comments, “Because that’s exactly what we need, while chasing down a rogue spectre agent with an army of Geth. Alenko is going to have his hands full if you do, exploding experimental parts in the field. Chakwas won’t let you hear the end of it.”

“You make it sound like I don’t know what I’m doing,” Annika tsks sarcastically, “You wound me, Ash.”

“Aww, did I hurt your feelings?” She asks, chuckling. Ashley nudges her shoulder with her own, “You’re good at what you do. I’m just better.”

“And you’re horrible at giving pep talks, by the way.” Annika says. When she turns, Ashley is marginally closer than she was before. She hesitates for a moment, before her omni-tool pings on her wrist. Tali. Ashley pulls away to find something other the cabinets. Annika has never been so glad the lights are so dim in the SR-1, as her cheeks flush.

They spend the rest of the afternoon arguing about weapon parts, about mods, about models. It was never a competition, but they compare reassembly times. Annika wins by three seconds. They promise each other a rematch after the Virmire mission.

She doesn’t receive her rematch.

Instead, she gets the last pistol Ashley eventually left behind because of the lack of accuracy, left on the weapons table.

En route to the Citadel two days later, she sits back down on the crate, gently taking apart the gun to reassemble it. She has to put the parts down after a while because of tears that threaten to ruin the wiring, curling up on herself as she sobs quietly.

She should’ve let Ash have her way.

But now?

The new Raptor she’s buying when they hit the Citadel is going to be the way Ash would do it. And she’s going to use it to put a pulse shot through Saren’s head, right in between those beady blue eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't you worry, Ashley is very much alive in Annika Shepard's timeline. I'll write a quick story for them at some point. Yes, I modded the game with the same gender mod.


	3. Day 3 - Epoch.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (n.) a particular period of time in history or a person’s life.  
> Day 3's prompt: Mass Effect + Andromeda
> 
> This chapter focuses on the fallout from Shepard's death on her close friend and ex-girlfriend Fiametta Myung, who becomes the Pathfinder in 2818, and the warning Shepard manages to get to her when the Reapers attack Earth only months after the Arks leave. No warnings apply.

_23:45. sent november 13th, 2185._

_> > video recovered._

_> video playing._

“Hey Dee–No that’s wrong. Shepard? Kodelyn? Commander? Fuck. Y'know what? No script.”

_[inhale and subsequent exhale. camera shifts to focus on dark haired woman in alliance clothes.]_

“Shepard. I don’t know whether to believe the rumors or not. For nearly a year they’ve said that you’re alive. Hell, Alenko came back a while ago from Horizon, shell shocked saying that Anderson was right. Don’t even know how I’m supposed to feel about that.”

“Feels like everything fell apart when you died. I lost my best friend, I lost the first ship I’d ever served on. I lost basically all of my contacts. The only person I’m still even in sort of contact with was Joker, but that was nearly…two years ago? I see Alenko whenever he’s on the Citadel, but he’s clammed up. Won’t say a word about you, about the Normandy, about anyone but his current assignments in the Terminus Systems. I think he’s in denial.”

_[dry chuckling. sighs.]_

“We’re all in denial, by the way. I wanted to go after Liara, find what she knew. Apparently she set up shop on Illium, but by the time I got there, she was gone. No one would tell me where she was. Alenko said Garrus was with you, so that’s some solace if you’re still out there. You know he’d follow you to hell and back after what you did with Saleon for him.”

“I still don’t believe you’re alive. I saw the reports. Saw the whole debacle over what attacked the Normandy. Good old Council, still denying everything. There’s no way that was the Geth. They’re only claiming that it was because they don’t want to start a mass panic over what they don’t know and can’t fathom in their peanut sized brains. I’m going to biotically smack Sparatus into next week if he claims Reapers don’t exist again.”

_[muffled conversation]_

“The real reason I’m making this video is because the Initiative is taking off in a bit. I know, it moved fast since my dad got shut down over SAM. We’re set to take off in the next two weeks, so everyone’s cleaning up shop. Farran has had his apartment cleaned out since we got clearance for the arks. He’s always been on board to head to Andromeda.”

“I didn’t want to leave at first. I helped the best I could before I headed off to Therum with Liara, but I thought that’s what was here for me. The Milky Way is my home. Then the Geth attacked and I saw you again. Then I decided I might just be a career soldier like my dad always wanted. I’m trained as an adept, you know. I was happy on the Normandy. Helping Liara with research, going out to uncharted worlds with you. I had my best friend and new friends all around me. It was far from perfect, especially with Hackett throwing mission after mission at us, and then Virmire…”

_[rustling of datapads. gets up, paces back and forth. sound is viable, but accompanied by the sound of socked feet on linoleum.]_

“Then you died. Then I didn’t have a purpose anymore, sitting in that escape pod for nearly a day, acting like a child. Rocking back and forth, crying to the point I couldn’t even really see or breathe. I didn’t want anyone to touch me, hell I went out on my own to search for you. I got lost. Tali found me, throwing pieces of the Normandy around like a raving idiot searching for anything that would point me back to you.”

“After that, I threw myself back into helping my dad. He was disgraced for SAM – I’m sure you know that bit by now. Everywhere on the Citadel reminded me of you. Everywhere in the Milky Way reminded me of you. I had to get out of here, and acting like the rest of the galaxy didn’t exist sounded like it would be the best course of action. Somewhere completely new, somewhere I could wipe the slate clean. Start over. Be happy again.”

_[laughs. sigh of disappointment. looks over to clock.]_

“Joker came to me in…late 2183, I want to say? Said Cerberus – yeah Cerberus of all people, those guys mixed up with the marines? – had you. Said they were rebuilding you and he had proof. I denied him, didn’t believe him. I knew he’d taken your death the hardest, that he blamed himself for it. I said things I shouldn’t have. I know I can’t justify it that ‘I was in a bad place’. I hurt him, I know I did. Then he was just…gone. Completely off the grid. Anderson couldn’t track him down. Your sister disappeared after that as well.”

“I felt so alone. Farran tried to comfort me. Didn’t work. The Initiative was tangible again, and I didn’t see dad for a while. I had never been so ready to leave before. Now looking around, the empty room, the severed ties with anyone else in the Alliance? I ask myself if I’m doing the right thing or not. Whether leaving it all behind is the right decision.”

_[more muffled conversation. swiping of another tab before returning to chair and sitting down.]_

“Look. If you are with Cerberus, I know you’re doing it for a reason. Maybe you’re a mole or something. Tearing them apart from the inside out. If you’re alive, shit if you’re even a little alive, please send me something. Confirm it, please. So I can reconsider all of this if I have to. I’d do anything to fight by your side again. Stop me before I make the most irreversible mistake in my life, Shepard. Kodelyn, please. Andromeda is full of opportunities, but you were everything to me. Alenko can mope all he wants, yes I knew about that, but you were my friend first, my girlfriend first, my sister first. You gave me so much, and now I can’t pay you back.”

“We can talk about Cerberus if that’s what you want. We can talk about whatever’s going on. Anything you want. I won’t judge.”

“Please. Come home, Shepard. I need you.”

_> video playback ended._

_> >video archived._

_23:56. november 13th, 2185._

-

_> received november 14th, 2185._

_> >opened july 8th, 2186._

-

_16:18. sent july 8th, 2186._

_> >video recovered._

_> video playing._

_{crackling. mumbled words. indecipherable. recorded on omni-tool.}_

_{clearing procedure}_

_{video stabilizing}_

_[woman appears. dark haired. recognized as commander shepard of alliance navy.]_

“Fia. Hi.”

“This is an entire year late. I know. I was too late, I think. I don’t know. Any records of the Myungs were erased from the Citadel databases. I just recently got access to classified and personal files back, yeah long story I was arrested for a couple months. Reinstated as of a few minutes ago.”

_[mumbled conversation from male voice behind subject. ignored.]_

“Find Vega, get him prepped for Mars. We’re going in quick and quiet but tell him to be ready if things get hot.”

_[video refocuses.]_

“Earth was just attacked. The Reapers are here. Sparatus is going to eat whatever a hat is in Turian places for denying their existence all these years.”

“The suicide mission against the Collectors was a success. They’re no more. But the Reapers…shit I just watched them take out Vancouver. We’re getting reports of other attacks all over the planet, more in the Sol system by the hour.”

_[woman pulls helmet out. video focuses.]_

“ _Shit shit shit shit_. If it’s any solace, my parents are alright. My brother is as well. Lali’s onboard with me. As far as Dr. T'Soni and Lieutenant Johansson are concerned, we don’t know. Last we heard they were on Mars, fighting their way to the archives for anything to fight the Reapers with. Staff Commander Petrakis has been off the grid for a couple months now, not a word out of her since the collector base assault. Major Alenko doesn’t know where she is, but we know we need to get in contact with her, and in turn Garrus and the others if we can. We need every force we can get.”

_[clattering noise sounds. more cursing.]_

“Fia. I’m so sorry. I heard AI took off a few months back while I was under house arrest. I know you’re probably gone, and I wish I’d seen it before. My omni-tool code changed back late 2185, security risk so close to the base assault. Lawson was worried after Horizon that brass would come after me. I’m so damn sorry.”

_[incoming call on another line.]_

“Please. If you get this, be careful. I don’t know if the Reapers will come after the Initiative. Be ready for anything. They will not stop at Earth, I know that much. Tell your father, Garson, anyone to be ready for whatever comes your way in Andromeda. I’ve always loved you, sister, girlfriend, best friend. You know that. I’ll always be with you, wherever you are.”

_[incoming call.]_

“Be careful, _tabula rasa._ There’s another galaxy out there, and if you all are the last humans out there after all this goes down, make us proud.”

_[incoming call.]_

“Don’t let the cycle take us again.”

_> video playback ended._

_> >video archived._

_16:25. july 8th, 2186._

-

_> received august 22nd, 2186._

_> seen august 30th, 2818._

_> >opened june 1st, 2819._

-

“So the Reapers were real then,” Cora says, turning to the Pathfinder, deep in thought, “They were in such a hurry to deploy us because whoever funded the Initiative–”

“They knew the Reapers were coming. We were humanity’s Noah’s Ark,” Fiametta Myung responds, shutting off the blue and white display in her father’s old quarters. Stepping back, she runs a hand through her brown and purple hair, “And now? We don’t even know if Earth survived all of that. And Shepard…”

“It’s been six hundred years. I get the picture,” Cora muses, “You said Dr. T'Soni travelled with her early on though? You think you might be able to get a message out to her?”

“If I could, I think we would’ve got one first from either her or Shepard. Either with the destruction of the galaxy or one of victory,” Frustrated, Fiametta sits down on the edge of the bed, “Cora, forget that T'Soni might still be alive. Do you think there’s a chance the Reapers could come for us?”

“All the way in Andromeda?” The commando shifts her posture, crossing her arms and leaning against the desk, “If you want my opinion, it’s a flat I don’t know. You worked with her closer than I did. Any Reaper information I heard about was secondhand accounts from you.”

“Great. I’m flying blind again. Tann is going to have my ass if we know about this and they show up in a couple months to finish the job,” Fiametta drags a hand down her face, flopping back on the bed unceremoniously, “I’m the worst pathfinder to ever pathfind. First my dad dies, then every planet in uninhabitable, can barely reunite all the races, can’t find the Quarian ark, and to top it off, nearly lost the whole Hyperion taking Meridian.”

“ _Well_ I was going to say that if they did…well we could get a headstart on them? Start bunkering down before they find us, so they don’t catch us off guard like they did the Milky Way,” She says, gesturing to the computer. That made sense. They probably hit Earth so hard because they hadn’t been ready. Fiametta scoffs inwardly, damn War Council never took Shepard’s word for anything and now they’d paid for it dearly. Her tone is still concerned, but softens, “And don’t say that. First, who knows if they managed to take down the Reapers anyway? Second, we don’t know jack about what’s going down in the Milky Way right now. Anything could’ve happened, and we could be worrying for nothing. You found Meridian, we took Meridian and took down the Archon. Hell you made every viable world habitable for generations to come. What’s a couple more to add to the list of achievements?”

“Cora, the Archon was _one_ dude. The Kett retreated, probably to gather more forces. These Reapers? They’ve been in this cycle for fifty thousand years, probably since the beginning of time. The Protheans weren’t the first to be wiped out, and they might not be the last either,” Fiametta curses under her breath, “We aren’t prepared for war. We’ve barely got enough forces to fight off the remaining Kett, much less another wave of space cthulus. We’re explorers, not an army.”

“It took us six hundred years to get out here. Maybe it’ll take the Reapers a whole lot less, but we’ve still got time if they do. I’ll requisition Tann for more forces on the edge of Heleus in a few years time if you’re still really worried. We just need to establish a foothold first and then we can have patrols out.”

“Now you’re making me sound crazy,” she notes, “Forget the Reapers for right now. Just stick a pin in it, Cora. I’m rambling, you don’t have to pay attention to me.”

“If that’s what you want,” Cora chides, striding over to the bed, “Hey. You’ve done a damn good job at colonizing Heleus. If anyone can take the Reapers, it’s you.”

“It’s Shepard, actually. She was the one with a Prothean cipher in her head,” While Cora sputters at the news, Fiametta chuckles, “Early 2183. Feros. Thorian. Some asari. I wasn’t there for it. Just… stressed about finding this all out now.”

“She was really important to you, huh?” Cora questions, bypassing the whole girlfriend thing, gears still turning in her head, “She’d be proud of you. Just like your father would be.”

“Hope so,” Fiametta answers, sitting up to face her second in command. She doesn’t know if it’s true, but if it makes Cora feel better about their situation, she can at least pretend to take the praise in stride. Her heart hurts, Shepard had always been there to guide her through the worst of it. And now? She was all alone, pathfinding without a path to follow, “C'mon, let’s get out of here before Jaal tears the Hyperion apart looking for me.”

Cora nods approvingly, a smile crossing her features. As the other woman leaves, Fiametta stands again. She pulls up the UI with a few swipes, scrolling back to the message. She watches it again. Shepard hadn’t looked all that well in those final moments. Bloodied and bruised, torn BDUs. Arrested? For what? Working with Cerberus? Hell if this so-called suicide mission was so successful, they should’ve given her a medal like they did after the Skyllian Blitz. Johansson – that was Annika. Petrakis was Brione. Vega, she hadn’t heard of a Vega before. Alenko…that meant Kaidan had been promoted after she left.

She misses them. Six hundred years separates her from the people that knew her best. 

Six hundred years separates her and Shepard. Her best friend. Her everything at one point. History would remember them for their sacrifices. They’d better remember her sacrifices specifically. Maybe she should try to get in contact with Dr. T'Soni. If Shepard’s message made it to them in-transit, maybe with the Nexus’ connections she could get her own out to the Milky Way. Find one of Shepard’s descendants, or one of the species that hadn’t been entirely destroyed if Liara’s research had been truthful when they had been working together.

Her hand hovers over the UI, considering. Her old life had ended. She hadn’t woken up a tabula rasa, but instead had changed Heleus for the better. She hopes.

Staying in the past wouldn’t get her anywhere.

_> video saved. june 1st, 2819._

_> >removed from active messages. june 1st, 2819. archived by pathfinder fiametta myung._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should probably write more for Andromeda, and replay it, but I honestly can't justify another playthrough because of the lack of real decisions and the game's inability to optimize properly to my computer system.


	4. Day 4 - Metanoia.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (n.) the journey of changing one’s mind, heart, self or way of life.  
> Day 4's prompt: Family.
> 
> This chapter focuses on Mason and Citlali Velasquez, Shepard's younger siblings who disagree about what to do with Miranda's offer to join Cerberus to fight along their sister prior to the events of 2184 and the chapter 'Scintilla.' No warnings apply.

“Does everyone know where I work now?”

Citlali stands from where she’d been leaning against a pillar, raising an eyebrow in poised confusion. Mason sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. Another headache coming on, he hadn’t had any coffee the last few days in between the work he’d been doing. Withdrawal is setting in, he figures. Not to mention the offer Ms. Miranda Lawson had given him only two weeks ago, right in the middle of the day.

It was driving him crazy, allowing his mind to run wild with the ideas that she’d implanted there.

But what was weirder was that Citlali was here. His older sister rarely visited him, after a falling out years ago at a family event they tended not to talk all that often. He very much knew she was in the wrong, but Citlali was still convinced it was on him. They’d never reconciled their differences, and after she went to work up on the fancy Presidium and him down in Zakera ward with Citadel Security, they hadn’t had to talk. Now she was here, waiting outside the C-Sec, looking every part the woman he remembered. Except substantially more tired.

“I wouldn’t be down here if it wasn’t important, Mason,” Red flag number one, something was going down, “And it is important.”

“If it is, then what’s going on? Whatever you have to say, had better be important enough that you stalked me down to my office,” He responds, taking a sharp turn towards the elevator to find the carpark and go home. How long had Citlali been here anyway? She lived on the Presidium these days, being nothing but a homebody, as his mother had not-so-helpfully updated him during her monthly visit. Why she was down in the wards now, a year after their sister was gone, finally coming to check up on him was beyond him.

“You’re my brother, Mason. Stop antagonizing me for two seconds,” She responds, that same ‘I know better’ tone used. Had been patented by his older sister for twenty one years now, had been used since the day he was born, and every single day since. He’s pretty sure it’s some superiority complex that her time at Jump Zero had given her, that or Grissom Academy. Whatever it was, it made her a grade A bitch towards him, and whatever offer she had for him, he wasn’t interested in listening to, “This is serious.”

“You need money to pay for that fancy apartment? Because sadly, officers like me don’t make that much,” Mason deadpans, striding into the elevator as Citlali scowls, following after him. Great, this was going to be a 'talk’. Rolling his eyes, he presses the button for the car park in the lower levels, “Dear sister, whatever could bring you down to me? You never visited before.”

“I-” She pauses, collecting her thoughts as she runs a hand through her hair, tousling out the curls from their father’s side of the family. He notes she’s more disheveled than usual, forgoing the usual pretty ponytail and white clothes fitting of an idol on Earth. Instead the blonde and brown curls dance around her shoulders in a messy heap, and he’s guessing by the leggings and oversized black sweatshirt that she hasn’t done laundry as of late.

Citlali always prized herself on being so put together and an icon. This was a little out of left field, and he’d admit he hadn’t seen her in months. What had changed, he wouldn’t know.

Maybe she was beginning to have remorse for people who weren’t her. For whatever reason, she took Kodelyn’s death much harder than anyone else. Even their parents, who they rarely saw outside of visits and vid calls, were beginning to stabilize their lives again without her. Citlali, it seemed, wasn’t, “I received an offer about a week ago.”

He looks up from his omni-tool, missing a beat of his heart. That meant he wan’t the only one who was visited as of late. Of course, he was being recruited for his engineering and infiltration capabilities, though he was sure it extended much further than that. Lawson was part of Cerberus, he knew that much. He was far from stupid, he’d made her come out and say it when she’d showed up in that white and black catsuit that was much more trashy than the classy way he was sure she saw herself. He’d finally come to the decision to tell Bailey about it, but he’d been out of the office today, “From Cerberus I’m guessing?”

She nods, leaning back against the wall of the elevator as it descends, “They want me to be a pilot for Shepard,” He sees a glimmer of hope in her faraway eyes, a sad smile crossing her features, “Mason, do you know what this means?”

“That Lawson is trying to recruit us to a known terrorist organization and enemy of both the Council and Alliance?” He asks, crossing his arms over his chest while the elevator pings with the floors they pass, the annoying music drowning out his less rational thoughts, “Don’t tell me you actually believed her, Citlali. Even you have to be smarter than that.”

“You…you didn’t believe her,” Citlali narrows her eyes at him, “Didn’t she show you the photos? Kodelyn’s _alive._ ”

“If they can experiment on people, if they can do what they did to Toombs, what makes you think this isn’t just a ploy for more willing subjects? You were there with the mission reports with Anderson, Citlali. How dense did you get? The writing is on the wall in blood, and you’re reading it as if it were in pink paint,” He snaps, “They could edit anyone to be on that table with how they lured Kahoku’s men out with the thresher maw, Kodelyn or not. That’s not her. Sooner you accept that, the sooner we all move on and get back to work.”

“They couldn’t fake those photos, Mason. They were real and you know that,” She follows after him as he marches out the elevator, making a beeline for where his skycar waits. Sooner he gets out of here, sooner he can ignore this whole conversation happened. Citlali was actually considering going to Cerberus. Jesus Christ, had she lost her mind? “When she wakes up, I’m going to be there for her.”

“If you’re not also strapped down to a table as soon as you arrive, and are having experiments run on you to turn you into a creeper or some shit,” Mason challenges, “Cerberus is a terrorist group, Citlali. They’ve committed crime after crime that the Alliance has just barely caught since Kodelyn blew their case wide open back in '83. That could easily be a clone, or an edit to lure someone with information on Shepard in. Kodelyn _died_ , Citlali. No one survives falling through a planet’s atmosphere. No one survives just being spaced like that. Absolutely no one. You can say space magic all you want, but anyone with common sense won’t buy that.”

Citlali is quiet as he finds his car, waving his omni tool over it to unlock the doors before she speaks again in a small, quiet voice he doesn’t recognize as her’s, “She’s our _sister_ , Mason. They’re putting her back together to fight the Collectors, and she’s going to need us against them,” He looks back at her, one hand on the handle of the car, “I’m going to the station, Mason.”

He doesn’t know what she expects him to say in response. Does she want him to stop her? To break down and go with her to an undisclosed location? He slides into the driver’s seat, starting the car as Citlali stands out of the way, her arm crossed over her body as if trying to protect herself, to make herself smaller. Rolling down the window, he looks out at her, “Then go. I won’t stop you, but you’re not dragging me to my death. If you’ve got a death wish, then I hope you find it.”

“Mason–listen to me. Whether Cerberus did shit in the past or not isn’t relevant. It’s _Kodelyn_. We have to go for her.” She argues, her blue green eyes glittering in the dim light of the car park, “We can’t just leave her!”

“No, _you_ have to go for her because you’ve never been able to accept the past. It happened with Grissom, it happened with Jump Zero. You can’t control me, and I’m scared to say I know better than you with trusting people,” Sighing frustratedly and seeing his sister’s genuine determination in her face, he shrugs, “Make this mistake if you have to, but consider the consequences before you leave. I already attended one funeral, don’t let yours be the second.”

With that, he drives away. He isn’t a horrible person telling Citlali to save herself, that much he can assure himself of. He’s looking out for himself, he knows that much. Cerberus had too much dark history for him to shine a light into, and as unsettling as the photos were, he didn’t believe they were real. Miranda Lawson made her case, in the middle of his lunch break no less. If her entire look didn’t scream suspicion, well he didn’t know what did.

His grip tightens on the wheel. The Geth ship destroyed the SR-1. Those that were lucky enough to make it to escape pods lived to tell the tale, sure, but his sister wasn’t in an escape pod. Bitterly he remembers the original pilot had been, had been the last person to see her alive. No one just survived that. He shivers, pulling back the memory of Lawson projecting the photos over his desk on her omni-tool. Her dark skin scarred and pulled open at multiple points. Hooked up to more machines than he could count on two hands. Hair burned away at her scalp, burns painting her skin like an abstract work of horror art. Bandages soaked through with blood, her eyes firmly closed. There was a reason he’d never become a doctor like his father wanted him to be.

Her limbs had been intact upon impact, Lawson had told him, the helmet had saved her brain. Her brain stem had remained in one piece for however long it was until someone brought her body back to Cerberus. Her nervous system, they’d have to try and repair what nodes were lost or give her new ones. That the new hardsuit the Alliance had issued only a few weeks after the Battle of the Citadel, it saved her life.

If you could call the experiment on the table still living. She’d appealed to his logical mind, assuring him they were pooling a massive amount of resources into bringing her back to consciousness. That she still had brain waves, only that they weren’t the active kind. He’d been calm, but angry. They’d turned his sister into a vegetable, and now was trying to convert his other sister into one of their lackeys.

They couldn’t just let Shepard die. First she was a figurehead for the Alliance after the Blitz. Now she was a trading chip for Cerberus, and she wasn’t even aware of it, if they managed to pull some serious space magic to bring her back. Shit, there were so many unknowns that he didn’t even want to think about. What if they changed her beyond recognition? Made her become something she wasn’t?

He wasn’t going. Citlali could goad him as much as she wanted, but Shepard was dead. His sister was gone, killed in action. That thing on the table wasn’t her.

Yet, when it’s eleven at night and he’s looking out over the wards from his apartment with a beer in his hands, he can’t help but look at the offer Lawson had sent to his omni-tool again. He memorizes the coordinates to the station that she claimed Kodelyn was on, saved them to his files. Just in case things went south, and he needed to get out into the Terminus Systems to pull Citlali’s ass out of the fire.

He doesn’t see either of his sisters again for another year.


	5. Day 5 - Fernweh.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (n.) a longing for far off places.  
> Day 5's prompt: Emotional Moments.
> 
> This chapter focuses on Brione's upbringing in the streets of London's megapolis, and the loss of her adoptive mother before the events of Mass Effect 1. No ties to the real London, of course. Warnings are as follows: blood, death, possibly horrifying description of both.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is gory, I will remind you of that. You can skip it.

“Mom–”

“Quiet,” The older woman ruffles her reddish-brown curls, whispering as her hand falls back to her side. The sounds of violence grow closer, shaking the building they’re in. The twelve year old bites her lip to keep from crying, though rogue droplets drip down her face anyways. Her adoptive mother offers her a weak smile to comfort her, “Brione, _please_. You need to get out of here. Someone’s going to be sweeping this building for loot, and I’d rather be here to shoot the bastard that did this instead of letting them come after you.”

“I’m not leaving you! I can’t!” She says forcefully, begging with the woman as she digs through her backpack for any medical supplies she can find, her hands shaking as she shakes empty ibuprofen bottles, praying one of them still had the beautiful sight of a pill in it. Medi-gel was like gold out in the slums, finding any without Reds on your back was a goddamn miracle. Yet, she’s not sure even medi-gel can help her now. She’d never been to a proper school, much less had learned how to be a field medic, “Mom, I can’t leave you, I won’t.”

“You’re leaving whether you like it or not,” Her mother coughs, before shoving her personal credit chit into her hands. She tries to shift out from under the fallen beam, though resigns to looking over to her young daughter with a pained grin as she bites back a scream of pain. It had crushed her legs when the building had first begun rattling, and Brione’s eyes are trained upwards. It wasn’t unusual for the poor buildings to be falling apart like this, but she’s worried she’ll have to jump away and get pulled away from her mother again. This was her fault anyway, she’d wanted to go scavenging in here, and now her mother was paying the price of her curiosity, “Get out of here, kid. Shit, that should be enough to get you on one of those overpriced shuttles and get you out to the Citadel.”

“I don’t want to go to the Citadel, I want to stay here with you!” She cries. Leaving Earth? How would she even get off the planet? The Citadel had aliens on it, and she didn’t know a lick of…well whatever language they spoke up there. What if they sent her back? What if it wasn’t enough money to leave? What if her mom died as soon as she left and there wasn’t something else she could’ve done? She’d never been offworld, hell she’d never even been out the city, much less the country. She can’t leave the one person that mattered to her behind, and she wouldn’t stand for it either, “Mom! Please, don’t make me leave you, I can still help you! I can shoot a gun just fine!”

“If you want to be such a big goddamn hero, then get out of here!” Her mom yells, gripping at Brione’s wrist as her hand delves back into the purple bag, Brione shrinking back into herself as she wrestles her hand away. A look of regret flashes over her mother’s face, before she steels her expression, “Kid, unless you can find yourself a biotic or a team of people who aren’t trying to get us all killed for creds, then you’re doing me a big ass favor by running like hell. This beam isn’t moving, whether you’re a superhero or not.”

“M-”

“Not a _single_ other word out of you. You said you’d listen to me because I gave you direction, damn well am I going to exploit that now,” The sounds of explosions grow deafening in her ears. The turf war is only getting closer, and she’s terrified, looking first at the glinting credit chit and smooth surface of the beam. Blood is pooling out from under the beam faster than she can register, staining the knees of her shorts red and bile rises in her throat as she raises her eyes back to the quickly paling face of her mother. Her green eyes are dimming, black hair plastered against her sweaty forehead. Yet, her determination still shines through as she points at the object she’d given her daughter with a shaking finger, “Back of the credit chit, coordinates. Go there when you get settled, you’ll find help.” She manages to get out between gritted teeth. Her breathing is becoming ragged, and that only worries Brione more.

She doesn’t get to flip the credit chit to verify what exactly she’s saying, before an explosion engulfs in the room in smoke, and throws her forwards with the force of impact onto the ground and burying her in strewn pieces of the building. Coughing and crying out dirt, she finds debris cocooning her afterwards as her ears ring in tandem with the alarms, dust and dirt coating her skin in a thin layer. One hand is clutching the credit chit like it was her only savior as her eyes try and make sense of the scene before her. Her clothes had already been torn and dirty, but she has to rip off the arm of her fraying sweatshirt to wrap around her now bleeding thigh when she pulls herself out from underneath the wood. The one shining light in the older neighborhoods of London was that they were still made out of steel’s cheaper counterpart. Less injury, but more susceptible to being torn apart during wars like this. The Reds, hell she’s pretty sure they don’t even know they were here.

Not like they would care.

“Mom! Debby!” Her voice sounds strained as she hacks up what she thinks is a dead animal, barely able to stand as her left leg gives out underneath her. Picking herself up on one elbow and then the other to force herself back to her feet, she tries to scream, but only a dry whisper comes out. Limping out from her saving grace, she looks around desperately, shading her eyes from the sunlight that had now breached their small hideout after the ceiling came crashing down. Swallowing to dampen her throat, she tries again, “Debby!”

There’s no answer.

None at all.

The building is unrecognizable, pieces of the place strewn about like a childhood’s playroom after a tantrum. It’s anyone’s guess where she is now, which side of the building she ended up on. Where her mother was. Whether she was even still alive past what she couldn’t see.

She trips over an untied shoelace, falling face first into the concrete. Her nose stuffs up with blood as it pools out onto the ground. Her omni-tool is broken, by the feeling of cracked metal against her wrist that digs into her skin, she knows the oldest model on the market is rendered useless now. Brione slides the chit into her shorts pocket, fumbling for purchase to pull herself back to her feet. Looking out over the wreckage of the building now, her vision is clearing while the salty tears mix with the metal taste of blood in her mouth. She spits, the murky liquid on the ground reminding her she’s lucky to be alive.

This isn’t the first time she’s been in the middle of a warzone. Twelve years had toughened her up to what the Reds and the other gangs were capable of. Before Debby she hadn’t had anyone, no one at all to help her, to care for her. Brione had been born in London, had never been anywhere else. She was small enough to get in and out of places people could only dream of managing to fit into. Smart enough that she knew better than to be out in the streets at night. Just innocent enough that most people gave her a fair price at the market for the meager credits she’d scrounge up for a loaf of bread every night. At first Debby was an annoyance, a thorn in her side to eat more vegetables, stop surfing the extranet so late at night and maybe to grow a conscience when she stole things from unsuspecting ‘surprise buyers’, then at eight she became her mom. At ten she became everything to Brione. That sinking feeling consumes her as she can began to hear yelling outside the building again.

She moves as fast as she can, dragging along her leg. She’d just lost her entire pack as well, which meant she wouldn’t eat tonight. None of the money she’d spent months saving for her mother’s gift, and her tech repair kit was gone as well. No connection to the authorities, or their single contact within the tenth street Reds. She fumbles with the clasp to her omni-tool before allowing it to fall next to her. No use for it now, and it’d only weigh her down.

Blood. _Shit_ , there is so much blood. Another rip to what’s left of her sweatshirt to wrap around her wrist until she can find bandages, or more suitable cloth for wounds. This shirt specifically had seen much better days than today, and she ran a higher risk of infection by leaving it on there.

She gets a glance of her pack out of the corner of her eye as she reaches the front of the building, contents fallen out and destroyed. Racing over as fast as she can, she digs through it. The zipper’s broken, any empty medicine bottles that she did have were cracked open. Water had split from where her bottle had blown open only a few feet away. Credit chits are already missing, surely underneath all the rubble nearby. The single, unloaded blaster that her mother had given her is still relatively intact, but being a scavenger for so long, she can guess her second nature is right when it says that looks are deceiving.

Shoving the water bottle back into her bag and counting the three credit chits she still has, she groans as her wrist begins to sting. Sliding the pack over her shoulders and doing a patch job with the last strand of wire she’d kept in her bag to close it, she twists her head back and forth. No one, except she’s beginning to hear the telltale sound of ground cars with their loud engines and louder tires on the pavement in the distance. She needs to get out of here before they arrive, before they take the few credit chits and water from her just for kicks.

What she sees next…hell describing it was a whole experience on its own, twenty years later and she still struggles to tell her therapist exactly how she remembered the last image of her mother. It takes her a moment to register, tilting her head even before she recognizes it as the half of a pale woman, blood splattered across the rest of her _corpse_ , crushed by what she believes to be a wall from the upper part of the building. Her mother had died when the rest of the building came down, and the eye she could see was still open, staring in her direction. She doesn’t even want to know what the other side of her wounded body looks like.

She vomits. Brione hadn’t eaten a lot for the last few days, but what liquid does, it burns the back of her throat with a yellow mush as it comes up and splatters on the floor in front of her. It turns into crying as she dry heaves, vision going blurry. Hiccups rack her body as she tries to get the image of her mother’s half body out of her memory, yet it sears itself into the back of her eyes as she turns firmly away from it.

Brione doesn’t know where she’s going as she limps away from the building, staying in the shadows of the other ruins of the slums. She can barely see her own beat up shoes, much less the shelter she walks into that evening.

Someone from the Reds picks her up in the days afterwards, someone she’s pretty sure dies a few years later. Listless and exhausted, the remaining years until her eighteenth birthday effectively a blur. The Alliance was her escape from a life of pain, a life of loss. Or so she thought, until Torfan occurred and she was labelled the Butcher for a mission gone wrong because of her own oversight.

There was a reason that someone with her seniority chose to follow, instead of lead. Because of her own stubbornness, it got her mother figure killed. It got her squad on Torfan killed. Because she hadn’t stayed just a little longer to make sure the younger members of her crew had gotten out first, Shepard died.

 _Tabula Rasa_ , a clean slate. One of Shepard’s favorite words. Placing flowers at the foot of her memorial, she prays that’s what she can give Shepard’s spirit, returning to the Alliance.

Yet, when she meets her again, working for Cerberus of all people, she can’t help but wonder if she made the wish too literal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be some focus on Brione in the upcoming book, especially considering how she ended up on the streets in the first place.


	6. Day 6 - Ashes.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (n.) the remains of something destroyed; ruins.  
> Day 6's prompt: Argument.
> 
> This chapter focuses on the fallout of Virmire and Shepard's decision to leave Ashley behind, especially on Annika Johansson. No real warnings apply except for major character death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is your Shenko chapter by the way. Hence the 'Minor Kaidan Alenko/Female Shepard' tag. If you squint, it's at the end. Yes, this a reupload of the Ashes that's already on my profile. It fits better here than on it's own.

She should be glad that the Corporal waited until after they left the planet to start yelling.

No one spoke after the _Normandy_ took off, after the cargo bay door closed their only view of the lush green planet, of the base they were leaving their squadmate – their _friend_ , behind on. The only acknowledgement was that Joker came over the comms, subdued to hell and back saying that once debrief was done, that the Council wanted a word with the Commander.

Kodelyn heard Corporal Johansson’s armor hit the floor as soon as they were aboard in the cargo bay, as soon as she’d put the Lieutenant down from where he’d been over her shoulder, the helmet clunked down to the ground with enough force to leave a dent. Not a single squad member said a thing, but in everyone’s eyes she could see the hurt, could see the wounded pride and the loss that went along with it. It was petty, but she couldn’t stand looking at the corner that Ashley often frequented, the work bench. Corporal Johansson gently brushed it with a gloved hand, blonde hair draped down in front of her face as she took it in. Kodelyn couldn’t see her expression. Couldn’t hear her if she had said something.

She didn’t want to.

Kodelyn should’ve said something then. Did something. Anything to soften the blow, like any good Commander should’ve.

But the broken look in Johansson’s eyes when she made the order to return to the bomb site instead of continue onto Kirrahe’s squad’s position was enough that she wasn’t willing to risk it in the slightest. Johansson was a vanguard, and while she hadn’t ever seen the woman flare outside of a combat situation, Kodelyn had enough bruises and cuts from Virmire as it was. Adding to it by flying back against a bulkhead would surely send her to Chakwas for the rest of the flight back to the Citadel.

Other than a glance to the rest of the squad to take stock, she took the elevator up to where her locker was. No one followed her up. She wants to say that was a good thing, she could be alone with her thoughts before the debriefing of all debriefings. Keep herself in check before she said something she shouldn’t.

But she doesn’t want to be alone, not now with all of her thoughts suffocating her. Kodelyn felt numb, slipping off her own helmet and brushing out her hair with a hand. She trudges over to the white and red locker, pulling off pieces of armor and carefully stashing them away. Her hands are trembling enough that she’s forced to slow down her normal routine. She can’t find the clips and buckles that she knows by heart, vision blurring not with tears but lack of focus. Even removing her chest piece doesn’t relieve her of the pressure that’s haunting her chest.

_“Go back and get Alenko–”_

_“–You know it’s the right choice, LT!”_

She has to take a moment, right there in her undersuit just to process. To accept that what was happening…had happened. That there was nothing she could do now. That if Johansson really was as angry as she assumed she was, then she’d have to face the music, face that look of loss that she’d only seen once before on her mother’s face. And really, she deserved it. Why hadn’t she sent the others over to get Ashley? Why hadn’t she tried to send someone else down for Kaidan? In that moment, she finds that there were so many things that she could’ve done that would’ve guaranteed that both the Gunnery Chief and Lieutenant would’ve returned to the _Normandy_ in one piece.

They were both willing to die for the cause. Willing to sacrifice so that the mission could be a success.

Kirrahe and his men had gone down with Ashley. So now, not only had she lost a skilled soldier, the last of the 212th, she’d also lost an entire squad of Salarian STG soldiers under her command.

While she yanked off her undersuit in her quarters, she looks in the mirror that hangs just off kilter on the wall, blinking once and then twice at the subdued mahogany irises with the darkness of insomnia underneath them. One hell of a Commander that she was. The wheels had come off that mission before she knew what was happening. She knew she should’ve sent Wrex with Tali ahead of them. Had been on the tip of her tongue when Tali had called in with an update of the situation from the CIC and that Private Petrakis had gone down to a Geth Prime. But no, she’d declined because she didn’t want to unnecessarily sacrifice their lives in favor of their own. She’d sent both her and Corporal Johansson back to deal with her wounds.

Pulling on her fatigues, she tries to justify the decisions. Knowing everyone would want answers, knowing she’s going to have to face the entire squad with those words, having to look at Lieutenant Alenko – _Kaidan_ , and find if she really hadn’t broken every reg in the book to go and save him.

The bomb had been important. It needed to go off, or the whole mission was doomed and they’d sacrificed Salarian lives for nothing. That they’d just nearly lost their lives for absolutely nothing. She wouldn’t have sent Wrex and Tali and her stead, even with Ashley covering for them they’d still be dug in anyway. There were no promises that Joker would’ve been there for both sets of squads. She could’ve costed them the _Normandy_ if she’d taken too long. The bet was in her favor for saving Kaidan.

She should’ve saved Ashley. If for just a moment, she could forget about the budding relationship between her and the Lieutenant, the strategic decision would’ve been to go back for the Gunnery Chief. The bomb had been described to her as impossible to shut off once started, and the Salarian Councilor would surely have less curt words for her once she flicked on the Godforsaken FTL comms after this meeting. Ashley was younger, yes, but still a force to be reckoned with. Kaidan had the seniority, but what did that mean if the Alliance cut ties with the Salarians?

Sacrifice. They’d warned her that she’d need to be able to do it, need to be able to make the hard decisions in the face of adversity. She’d said she could, said she was willing to hunt Saren down no matter the cost. To bring him to justice, and end his reign of terror.

So why was she here, unable to breathe and the room spinning around her like a ferris wheel? Unable to get those confused and wounded hazel eyes of the Lieutenant out of her head, unable to stop hearing Ashley’s desperate voice out of her ears?

Once this mission is over with, she’d have to tell Anderson. Have to tell her father figure that she’d broken a regulation, and it costed them a whole soldier. She’d probably be reassigned from the _Normandy_ , or in the worst case, that the Lieutenant would be. Demoted for fraternization, a black mark on her otherwise clean record. She’d never stop agonizing over it, and facing her mother and stepfather with those actions behind her.

A headache is starting to form just behind her eyes.

“Commander, the squad’s in the comm room,” Joker’s voice comes over the room’s comms as she pushes a hair band onto her wrist. She looks like a dead woman with her hair down around her shoulders, frizzed at the ends. Scars criss-crossing over her face, bruises from where a krogan had gotten much too close and got a nice hit in with his shotgun before Liara sent him flying. She doesn’t think she’s ever had her hair down around the crew before, but with how she was picking up the pace to just fasten her fatigues back on doesn’t leave her with a choice. If she stayed up here any longer they’d think she was stalling, “Just uh, letting you know ma'am, in case you needed time to yourself after…everything. Want me to recall them for later?”

“No. No, I can handle this now.”

_Can she?_

_Can she really go down there, look into the impossibly indigo eyes of Corporal Annika Johansson and tell her that she’d sacrificed her friend, maybe even her girlfriend not because she was selfish and had kept Kaidan around just to quell her need for acception, but instead because it was a tactical decision?_

“Thanks anyway, Joker.” She says, grateful that Joker hasn’t started trying to dig into her for her decision. He’s probably just as upset, Ashley had gotten close to just about everyone on the crew. He simply makes a noise of understanding, before the comm clicks off and leaves her in silence. Pressing the button to open her door, she pushes her gaze up from the floor. She couldn’t say she had any pride over this decision, but it was better than coming off guilty and worn down. Or, she hopes it is.

Climbing the stairs and firmly keeping her eyes off the station just outside her room, her thoughts fade to static. What was the appropriate response here? Lay out the facts first, right? Debrief, explain herself if she had to. Quell a mutiny. Wasn’t the first time, but she supposed it wouldn’t be the last either. She was sure this would split the squad in half over a matter of opinions, or maybe they’d all be against her. Who really knew?

Kodelyn doesn’t even realize she’s there until she’s tapping the door open. Until the silence is ground into her as she strides inside, before turning to her squadmates.

Ashley’s chair is empty. Annika sits beside it on one side, Kaidan on the other closest to her. Liara’s eyes are downcast, Garrus’ visor is off for once, and Wrex has the same unreadable expression as always. Briony has chosen to stand, instead leaning against the railing with her eyes pinned just beyond Kodelyn. She has bandages wrapped around her head, another around her left bicep. That gives her solace, that she managed to pull Briony out of the fire before things got past the point of Chakwas being able to do anything about it.

She can see the light corona of blue flickering in and out around Corporal Johansson’s lithe form. Like the beginning embers of flames, they lick her pale, scarred skin, her lavender eyes mixing with the blue of biotics. She’s trying to keep her powers from flaring, but it isn’t being held back as well as she thinks.

“I…I can’t believe that Ash didn’t make it. How could we just leave her down there?” The lieutenant questions, as Annika shifts in her seat, fully forward with her head on her hands and her elbows on her knees. Expecting an answer. The hurt inflected in Kaidan’s question shakes her to her core, but after a moment she allows herself to meet his eyes. This was real. It wasn’t a dream, it wasn’t a nightmare. Ash really was gone, and giving voice to those words that she’d thought as she raced back towards the bomb site only made it all the more shocking to her system.

“Williams knew the risks going in. She gave her life to save the rest of us.” Kodelyn answers, firm but quiet enough that she can see Private Petrakis straining to hear her in the dead silent room. Should she speak any louder, she’s not sure she’d still sound like herself. She swallows down a lump in her throat, crossing her arms over each other just to give herself a sense of stability.

This is why there were fraternization regs. So you weren’t choosing between your lover and a good soldier. So there was no hesitation in the field if it did come down to a decision like this. Guilt over the unlucky party was natural, but there was no indescribable feeling like there was now, choking her, punching her in the gut as she tried to focus on the people around her.

Her hands are shaking.

“But why me? Why not her?” He asks, his voice cracking just so. Had they been alone, had they been anywhere else, she would’ve wanted to hug him, say anything, do anything to quell that pain in his voice. But they’re not, and there are rules and regulations that she’s already left behind her because of this.

 _Because I care about you_ , she desperately wants to admit, _because I don’t know what I’d do with myself if I knew I was the reason that you weren’t going home to Vancouver._

“I’m sorry, Kaidan. I’d never leave you behind. I couldn’t. You know that.”

She’s already pushing boundaries here with her choice of words, and one of Liara’s artificial eyebrows raises out of the corner of her eye. Maybe in surprise, maybe in confusion. Annika actually does flare for a moment, quick enough that if Kodelyn had blinked in that moment she would’ve missed the flames rising off her. Kaidan’s mouth falls open for a moment, then snaps close. Organizing his thoughts, she’s sure.

“I know. And I am grateful. But Ash died because of me. Because of _us_.” He responds, knowing full well what he means. Or at least, what she hopes he means. She should be happy, being referred to as part of an us. Being part of anything at all, really. But instead the stone in her empty stomach weighs more than it did before she walked inside. It was because of this _us_ that she’d chosen wrong. That the Williams family wouldn’t be seeing their daughter ever again, that her three younger sisters would no longer have her to look up to.

Wasn’t Sarah set to graduate this year?

“It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t my fault. The only one to blame here is Saren.” She answers solemnly. It’s quiet for a moment. For a moment she believes she’s done it right, believes that she’s not only comforted Kaidan to the best of her ability, but also quelled anyone’s doubts, before a chair scrapes across the ground of the debriefing room.

She raises her head to the pale form of Annika Johansson.

The woman stands only a half an inch shorter than her, but with enough muscle to compensate considerably. Eye to eye with blazing blue eyes as she feels energy spark against her skin that she attempts not to flinch from, the shock of electricity that runs up her spine. She’d never seen a biotic that didn’t intend to kill her this close before save for Kaidan, and if she wasn’t trying to keep from bawling like a baby in front of her squad, she think it was beautiful. The supernova of blue and white that raises hairs on her arms, one that had probably nearly killed her a few times.

She doesn’t know whether Johansson intends to kill her or not. Personally, she isn’t sure if she wants to stick around and find out either.

“Shepard, I would follow you to hell and back but _what the hell were you thinking back on Virmire?_ ” Her voice is deep, rough, scratchy with what she assumes is unshed tears, “Where was the strategist I met on Feros? The one who would’ve gone back for Chief Williams – for Ashley? When did she die?!”

“I made the choice that strategically sound at that moment, Corporal,” She steadies her voice, or tries to, “I made the decision that would guarantee that the mission would succeed. If I could’ve saved the Chief, I would have. But sacrificing more lives for one would’ve put us at the tactical disadvantage.”

“Bullshit!” Johansson’s hands ball at her sides into fists, as if she’s not entirely sure what to with them. Surely even in her heightened emotional state, she remembers that violence against her CO wasn’t going to get her anywhere. That at least keeps her heart from jumping out of her chest as Johansson grows closer, “You think we’re all blind don’t you? As if you can keep playing this game of fantasy and break the regulations you deem as fair game!”

“Johansson.” She states warningly, but the recoil in Johansson’s expression never comes like it should’ve. Kodelyn wants to pull rank, wants to put her in her place, but if she doesn’t deal with this now, doesn’t hear out her own squad, then was she any better than anyone else they were fighting these days? She had to be the bigger person, and if that meant hearing her own thoughts come back at her, then so be it, “I made the decision. The bomb needed to go off, and I went back for the Lieutenant because we needed to secure it. Had we not, we would’ve sacrificed the STG’s squad’s lives for nothing.”

“You–” Johansson’s eyes narrow, pressing an electric finger to her chest roughly, “–just wanted to screw Alenko a few more times before all this was over! You pretended as if you could just play God for a couple more days, as if you’d pulled the wool over our eyes. News flash! Ashley was a person too, and she deserved to live just as much as your precious Lieutenant, _if not more_!”

Kodelyn lets that sink in. So that meant that they knew, or at least Johansson did. About what? She didn’t have anything to hide, and neither did Kaidan. Hell, she couldn’t even classify this as a real relationship, and going as far to accuse her of only keeping Kaidan around because she liked the way he looked? She bites her tongue to keep from snapping entirely. Before he was anything else, he was a capable L2 sentinel, and a friend. Anything more, and that was when you became delusional. She knew better than the assume where she stood with someone.

She pulls herself back together.

“My personal relationships, if they existed or otherwise, did not factor into my decision, Johansson. I’ve stated my case, and my _friendship_ with the Lieutenant did not affect it.” Her voice wavers at the admission, and selfishly wonders if that confession would affect this back and forth, never concrete relationship with Alenko. He’d always said to leave herself a way out, and she’s really hoping that she hadn’t just given him another one, “Ashley was a damn fine soldier and that decision wasn’t made lightly.”

Johansson is literally shaking, she can see her blonde hair flying as her grimace turns into an ill-timed smile, a chuckle escaping her, “Everything’s just perfect for you, isn’t it Commander? Damn peachy, huh? A family supporting every decision you’ve ever made, a Captain watching your back, damn Spectre status, commanding the first stealth-recon ship of it’s kind and a biotic _boyfriend_ to back you up? Really, Shepard. You didn’t even think about the people you were tearing Chief Williams – _Ash_ away from, did you? Didn’t even think about the people who cared about her, about the people who would grieve for her until the end of their days, about the people who lost the one thing still tying them to this damn galaxy, did you?”

Kodelyn is beginning to see the cracks in her resolve. It hits her like a brick, Johansson had no family left in the galaxy, and after Akuze, no prior squadmates either. She had lost everything before the SR-1, and now losing Ashley, however close they were, shattered her entirely. She still has her concerns that the vanguard might biotically punch her into next week, but she stays firm in front of her, “Ash was my friend too Johansson, just as much as anyone else in this room. Had I been able to spare the men to do it, you’d better believe she’d be in here with us. But because of her, we don’t have cloned Krogan on our asses now, and Saren’s been taken down a peg because of it.”

“We lost both her and an STG squad because of it. You knew that bomb was going off either way, you just didn’t want _your_ Alenko in the center of it. The hell is your moral compass, Shepard? Do you have any idea how much she meant to her family, to the crew? To us? To _me_? Do you know who the hell you sacrificed just so you could have _him_ of all people back in the comm room?”

Kodelyn doesn’t dare meet Kaidan’s eyes from where she can feel them burning into her side. Everyone is waiting on an answer, and she has to really think for a moment before she answers anyone. Johansson might’ve just exposed herself to being more than just friends with Ashley, but she’s not willing to pull out her big book of regulations to put her down, nor does she wants to sow the seeds of dissent in the ranks with any pissed off response. Instead, she pulls her hand from where it had been crossed over her chest and gently places it on her shoulder. It burns like a bitch for a moment until she manages to find her words, “I get it. She meant a lot to you, Johansson. I don’t think I ever saw the two of you without the other down in the cargo bay. I get it. And I’m sorry I couldn’t bring her back for you. If you don’t think this is going to haunt me until the day I stop breathing, then you’re dead wrong. I don’t ever make a habit of losing soldiers under my command and Saren is going to pay for her. You ask me whether I know how much she meant to her family…damn it, Johansson, I’m going to have to call them and tell them that I’m the reason she won’t be back for shore leave this year. I’m going to have to tell Sarah, Lynn and Abby that I’m the reason their sister won’t be back for Christmas. So yes, I have an inkling of what she was to the people around her.”

Annika’s eyes still smolder with blue, but her form falls from a defensive position to one of acception. Mission accomplished then, and without her knocking her shoulder back into place (Kodelyn makes a mental note to visit Chakwas once she dealt with the Council). Kodelyn softens her voice, not willing to raise her frustration any further, “I’m sorry I couldn’t do more. And I’m sorry we’re down a soldier and a friend. But channel that anger towards Saren instead of me, if you can. He’s the real reason we’re missing our Gunnery Chief Williams.”

She deflates. Kodelyn stops feeling shocks of lightning up and down her fingertips once she does, and Johansson steps away from her, gaze averted. Addressing the rest of the room, “Dismissed. We’ll be on the Citadel in a couple hours, you need me, you know where to find me.”

Johansson is gone as soon as the order is given. Petrakis follows silently, though there’s a limp in her step as she makes her way towards the doors. Liara moves to help her, with Garrus and Wrex on her heels. She leans back against the FTL comm system, careful not to bring up the interface and rubs at her temples. A headache is pulsing at the back of her eyes, and she figures this day isn’t done with her yet. Her hair falls forward as she pulls it up into a ponytail, immediately hyperaware that Kaidan hasn’t moved from his seat on her right. If she was going to take a guess, all the stress of Virmire not to mention they’d been out for most of the day was going to bring on a migraine. A part of her wants to talk about this – about them, but she can’t find the words now. Can’t even think of bringing that idea back to the table considering their current situation.

She doesn’t have to, as he stands first, “Ma'am–Shepard?”

“Go ahead, Lieutenant.” She says, raising her eyes to his. All the fight has spilled out of her into the comm room, and she doesn’t want to alienate him anymore than she already has. She’d been so blind, thinking no one else would be any the wiser. Hell, he practically haunted that terminal outside her room, and she allowed it. Anyone could’ve overheard their conversations in the mess, and now it was coming back to bite her in the ass. She knew all of this was too good to be true, and it’d gotten Ashley killed. Had probably earned her a one way ticket off the _Normandy_ while she was at it. Nothing came without a price, and here was her invoice.

“I–thank you. For saving my life,” He states. He seems conflicted for a moment, unsure of how to continue, his voice dropping to just above a whisper, “Shepard, you did all you could. Anything short of a miracle in the form of the Alliance’s warships over the planet couldn’t have saved her.”

“I’d like to think that, Alenko. But then there’s reality. Should’ve sent Tali, Wrex and Johansson ahead to get her.” She answers. He’s close enough that she can see the scars that he’d earned recently. One of which is on his jaw, and she winces, “There are so many things I could’ve done, so many things I should’ve done that I didn’t in that split second. Johansson was right, the strategist in me died on Feros.”

“Don’t let the what-ifs drag you down, ma'am. Because of you, Saren’s facility on Virmire is done for. There won’t be any Krogan fighting for him when we finish him off,” He responds, “Maybe this wasn’t a picture perfect victory, but you did something they deemed impossible.”

“Saren is getting the ass-beating of the millenia when I find him for Jenkins, Nihlus and Williams,” She responds coldly, before turning from his form to flicker on the comm interface, “Do you need anything else, Alenko? I’m sure the Council wants to talk about this colossal failure of a mission before we land and they do it in person with an audience.”

He’s quiet for just a moment, “Thank you, for defending me against Johansson. I know you wouldn’t let… _this_ , get in the way of a mission, ma'am. If it means anything at all, I think you made the right decision,” Again he pauses, double taking on his words, “I mean, sorry Shepard, that sounded selfish.”

“No, no it didn’t, Alenko. And thank you,” She turns over her shoulder, offering a gentle smile. To think he thought that he was being selfish, just for being grateful that he lived to fight another day, “For not giving up on me.”

“You’re welcome, ma'am. You know where to find me if you want to talk, about anything.” His voice softens further, and she’s not sure what to say. Instead, she nods as the door closes behind him with a satisfying thunk.

She watches him leave. She straightens her fatigues and brushes her loose hair back as she cracks her jaws. Three of the biggest annoyances in her career thus far come onto the vid, and she puts on a neutral face to receive their thoughts on the mission, “Commander Shepard–”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As noted earlier, Annika and Ashley will be back in another incarnation of the story.


	7. Day 7 - Lacuna.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (n.) a blank space, a missing part.  
> Day 7's prompt: Celebration.
> 
> This chapter focuses on the opening scenes of Mass Effect 2, including a tie-in from the chapter 'Scintilla' with Shepard's reunion with both Joker and her younger sister. No warnings apply.

She's still groggy as hell when the comm to effectively her new boss shuts off, readjusting her eyes to the dark comm room and rubbing the nonexistent sleep out of her eyes. Sore in a few places (all of them, there wasn't a single place that didn't strain when she moved -- bitterly she wonders who in hell woke her up apparently six months too early, and if they were still alive she was going to smack them to hell and back), and she can't help but gingerly touch the scars on her jaw. It was surreal to both be here, with Cerberus of all people, and to even be alive at all. To have to credit them with bringing her back to life, functional as far as she was concerned, was a little disquieting.

It's her, as much as she knows. Her thoughts still feel like her own. Her memories are all still there, fresh in her mind.

Two years, and twelve days. She can't believe it'd been that long, it felt like a very painful nap from when she'd suffocated in the wreckage of the Normandy, to when she woke up in the lab. Only a few moments before she was thrusted back into the waiting hands of the devil who couldn't let her die. Her first thought had been Joker as she raced around the station avoiding mechs left and right, she knew that the rest of the crew had gotten off the ship before she even reached the cockpit, but she'd been terrified she'd sacrificed her own life only to have one of her _friends_ die on her. Then it'd been the rest of the crew, Liara, Garrus, Wrex, Tali.

 _Kaidan_. To hear the Illusive Man confirm he was still alive gave her some peace of mind among all the unknowns. What he'd say to her new allegiances, she didn't know. But if he was still Alliance, and Anderson was still alive, she could find him. Explain what was going on, bring him back onto the crew. Then do the same with the rest of them, though finding them sounded significantly more difficult than finding a fellow officer.

Two years and twelve days she'd spent on that operating table on the Lazarus Project station, having Cerberus do God knew what to her to bring her back to life. There had to be some serious tech involved, because while Miranda had confirmed that no, she wasn't a cyborg and would still pass as organic, there was no way someone spent four billion credits to bring back a simple soldier who'd probably burned up past recognition on reentry.

742 days of being technically dead, dead as a doorknob really.

Miranda said they'd restored her as is. But something about this body just felt off. Maybe because she'd lost the muscle she once had, making the armor set much heavier than she remembered on her now lithe body. The textures felt weird pressing against her skin, the curls on her head completely gone in favor of her natural hair, short and fluffy and in a style she hadn't worn since basic training all those years ago. Other than the scars on her face, every other one was just...gone. Even the one on the back of her neck from the fight with Saren's corpse was missing, smooth, untouched skin there instead.

Skin grafts, if she had to make a guess. Though, it was so seamless when she'd been able to remove her armor before the mission to Freedom's Progress that she wasn't entirely sure what to believe. Was she still her? That was the real question. Looking into a mirror in the bathroom, the scars glowed red omniously. Organic was what she hoped she was, but that was beginning to look like too much to wish for.

Freedom's Progress was just a big disassociation fest, getting used to the off center weight of the N7 armor (it wasn't like any model she'd seen before, which was to be expected two years after the last time she'd been in armor), the use of apparently thermal clips (the hell were those?) and the fact she didn't have a supply of omni-gel at her disposal anymore (which she relied on when she didn't have Kaidan, Garrus or Tali in her immediate squad). It didn't feel like her body that was taking every shot with wavering accuracy. It didn't feel like _her_ who'd reunited with Tali and helped her with Veetor.

She didn't like 2185 to begin with, and it only kept getting worse. Human colonies, abductions, Cerberus, Collectors. None of it seemed real. Sarcastically she wonders how the galaxy went to shit as soon as she died. 

It still felt so weird saying that.

_She'd died._

And now the Illusive Man was giving her a ship, which she's assuming is fully kitted, paid for by who knew what funds, and either a very cocky pilot or a very capable one.

The hopeful thought flits across her mind before she even hears his voice from behind her, "Hey, Commander. Just like old times, huh?"

She can't stop the smile that spreads across her expression, feeling relief wash over her body as she turns from the comm station. 

Joker.

Of course, it'd be Joker. She doesn't know how it could've been anyone else, and damn well she wouldn't accept anyone else. Except she's not entirely sure how to react, instead walking over to him on unfamiliar legs, "I can't believe it's you, Joker." She says, just a little incredulous as he turns up the stairs, and she follows without another word, taking in the sight. How he's up and walking -- albeit more limping than anything else, but still worlds better than the first time she'd met him, is a question for later. One of the thousands that she figures he can answer better than the Illusive Man, Miranda or Jacob combined.

Shit, she's never been so happy to see her pilot before.

"Look who's talking, I saw you get spaced." He answers sarcastically, though she can hear a smile in his voice, maybe just as happy to see her as she is to see him. It's unsettling to see him in Cerberus colors, yet she's sure he has some funky reason for it. Yet his response is the most familiar thing she's had since she woke up.

Her throat tightens up just thinking about the moments before she'd lost consciousness, choking on the lack of air as the vacuum of the galaxy spun around her in a dizzily pretty array.

She wills the memory away.

"I got very lucky, with a lot of strings attached, unfortunately," She deadpans, feeling one of her knees crack again, the shift of armor scratching through her undersuit. Another Cerberus sigil on the wall sends shivers down her back, "How'd you get here?"

"It all fell apart without you, Commander. Everything you stirred up, the Council wanted gone," He sounds disappointed, and she grits her teeth. Of course they did, they didn't believe her about Saren until it was too late, she wouldn't put it past them to forgo believing her about the Reapers either. To keep their idea of peace instead of acting on the writing on the wall, deciding to paint over it entirely. It was going to get them killed and doom the galaxy, "Team was broken up, records were sealed, and I was grounded. The Alliance took away the only thing that mattered to me. Hell yeah I joined Cerberus."

It was an injustice enough to keep Joker anywhere but on the _Normandy_. Considering his words, they turn a corner. There's someone else standing at a large bay window as her next question dies in her throat, taking in their appearance. A woman with tanned brown skin, she thinks, staring out into what she thinks is a hangar, dark hair in a ponytail pulled through the back of her hat. She's dressed identically to Joker, and when she hears them talking, she turns her head towards them, arms crossed over her chest.

"Commander," She nods, smiling, "Good to see they finally got you out of that bed, _hermana_."

It takes her just a second to recognize the slight accent, the way she holds herself. Her green blue eyes boring into her soul from underneath the SR-2 hat. The tiny frame that could still throw a Mako over her head with her biotics if she wanted to. The grin that has a mischief undertone to it.

The other woman barrels into her while Kodelyn holds her arms out for her. Her sister's arms hold her tightly, and she embraces her just as tight back. Afraid to let go, almost. As terrifying as it was to think Cerberus had gotten their grubby hands on her younger sister, she's just glad to see her alive and well. Tears are pooling in her eyes as Citlali mumbles something into her shoulder, before pulling back with a grin, "It's...it's great to see you. Thought Miranda was crazy at first with this whole Lazarus Project thing. Didn't think a word of what she said was possible, still I went anyway because it was _you_. Damn glad I was wrong."

"I-yeah. Yeah, Lali, I've never been so glad to see you somewhere you don't belong." She says sarcastically, though unable to keep from a small chuckle.

"Hey, I belong just as much as Joker here does," She laughs herself, gently pulling her by the hand over to the hand over to the window, which she assumes is a dark hangar that houses the new ship they'd be using. She has a million questions about how she ended up here, where her parents were, where her brother was, yet she bites her bottom lip to keep from going on a tangent, "Whether I belong here or not is beyond the point, sis. We've got a mission to do, and I'm sure as hell not going to let you do it alone."

"Excuse you, she wasn't going to do it alone whether you were here or not," Joker reminds the sisters of his presence, her sister giving her a look that was half offended, half amused. If she had to take a guess, they'd been here together a while. More questions cropped up, now how Joker was brought on, and then how Miranda managed to convince her sister to come onto what she believes is her new crew. Hopefully because she's not in armor, she won't be on the squad.

"You trust the Illusive Man?" She asks skeptically, turning back to the pilot and raising an eyebrow. Kodelyn didn't trust him as far as she could probably throw him, which probably was rather far. Her sister shrugs.

"I don't trust anyone who makes more than I do," Joker deadpans, and Citlali snickers here, classic Joker, "But they aren't all bad. Saved your life. Let me fly--"

Citlali moves to flicker a light on nearby, "Let _us_ fly."

At the most, that answers her earlier question. If anything, now her sister was living the dream she'd had for years. Just for a mix of all the wrong and right reasons.

" _And_ , there's this." He says, gesturing out to the dark hangar, lights flashing on. They glint off a ship she can't make out just yet, but her eyes widen as she puts the pieces together. The familiar design and hull of the ship, the pattern that jumps out at her once enough lights are on, "They only told us last night."

SR-2 is painted near the cockpit, Cerberus' logo following after it. She's stunned, and for good reason. They built the new _Normandy_ while she was sleeping, and she has more concerns the Alliance might have moles in their company if they got plans for the new version. But her heart still swells seeing it, her smile only growing. Having both one of her friends and her sister by her side, and the Illusive Man's ominous answer to her questions on her squadmates...well she has some hope she'll see them all again.

"It's good to be home, huh Commander?" Joker asks, turning his attention back to her.

"I guess we'll have to give her a name." Kodelyn concludes.

"She's got a name, just a different designation is all," Citlali answers, breaking her immersion in awe by bumping her shoulder, "C'mon. The crew's already on board, plus Miranda will have our heads if we don't leave on time."

 _This is all crazy_ , she thinks as they meet Miranda and Jacob at the door, Joker and Citlali going ahead without her. She's given her own Cerberus issue clothes, different than her pilots' and what she assumes is the Captain's version of it. Someone else takes her armor plates from her, and she finds it rather easy to slide the clothes on over her undersuit and change out of it. The new ship is bright, larger than before once she lays eyes on it. Huge even. The cockpit alone has it's upgrades, but the CIC is massive compared to the SR-1's.

It isn't exactly home, she finds. So many different faces wandering around the ship, so many new features that definitely weren't in the plans for the SR-1. Yeoman -- _Kelly_ Chambers is friendly enough, though she's never had her own assistant to file things. Miranda is just as cold as she was when they first met and is apparently her XO now (not her first choice, but at the moment she doesn't have any other choices), Jacob doesn't say much she doesn't already know. Joker is just happy to be back in _a_ Normandy, forget who built it, Citlali more than excited to finally put her schooling to use, hands flying over the controls at a speed that only her senior pilot can match. EDI is a new variable, one Joker doesn't like, one Citlali is wary of. Dr. Chakwas is a happy addition, the older woman was just as glad to see Kodelyn as she was to see her. Pressly was apparently dead, but they hadn't replaced him. Miranda got the XO position Pressly had, Citlali got the navigator duties.

Her cabin is on it's own floor, dubbed the loft by Chambers. There's a fish tank bubbling on one side of the wall, though devoid of any life so far. Fitted with a bed meant more for two, and enough work space for four.

It feels empty. Lonely even as she takes in all her new things scattered across the room.

They've got a mission to Omega, to find a Salarian doctor by the name of Solus. Dossiers for Archangel, who's also on Omega, a Krogan scientist on Korlus, and a criminal on Purgatory. None would be her first choice, but her first request was to get to the Citadel. She needed Alliance and Council allies, and she knew she could rely on _Councilor_ Anderson. En route, they've got about a day until they dock.

While she has some worries about how it was acquired, she's more than happy when she finds nestled among her Cerberus issued belongings is a photo of Kaidan propped up on her desk. She places it back down, grinning like an idiot. He was still alive, not one of her dossiers but that was the only thing not making her want to defect entirely.

It'd be just like old times when she found everyone else. They'd take down the Collectors just as they did Saren, Cerberus or otherwise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here is all my works for Mass Effect Relationship week 2020! Super proud of myself for keeping up with the days and still having the quality be good! This leads into the book 'All The Stars' which is effectively a retelling of ME2.


End file.
